Most dieticians agree that dietary fiber promotes good health. Most people in the United States do not ingest sufficient fiber in their daily diet; hence, extra fiber per day needs to be ingested to meet daily health needs. Fiber supplements to complement daily diet fiber requirements are known, but often are not palatable. They often have to be taken as a water slurry which may be viscous or bad tasting. Food or confectionary supplements also are known, but the fiber and solids content of these supplements is often low, or if high in fiber and/or solids have a poor taste, poor mouth feel and/or other undesirable organoleptics.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,540,350 to Pfeiffer describes making a cooked fiber confectionary product; but generally with very high fiber content, the product admittedly was judged to be unacceptable. Moreover, the product strictly required a balance of reducing and non-reducing sugars for acceptability. To make the product, the patent describes making a premix of fat and carbohydrate sugars, cooking the premix at 105-132° C. and then later trying to load the cooked premix with fiber by mixing the warmed cooked premix with the fiber. That could prove difficult and limited the maximum amount of fiber that could be put into the confectionary.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,517,886 to Chau et al. also describes making a confectionary with dietary fiber where the confection includes a saccharide component, a hydrated hydrobinding component (e.g. corn syrup rice syrup, fructose syrup), and a fat component. The point of Chau is that the confectionary is uncooked and does not require heating to remove water.